We’re back in one piece and (so far) disease free, just as promised.

We opted to skip the last day of PAX for a casserole of reasons, all of which turned out to be the best idea ever when we heard reports of 3+ hour border waits and epic downpours later. As it was, it took us exactly three hours from door to door and we were home just after 2pm after a fantastic weekend of nerdy goodness and excellent friends. We were a little sad to be missing out on the last day, but at the same time we were PAX’d out – we spent the ENTIRE day there on Saturday, and had seen (almost) everything we wanted to see. Heading downtown sounded good, until the logistics of it all came up – $25 to park, massive crowds of people, then a really long drive home when you factor in everyone ELSE trying to get back to Canada – ugh.

So, how was it? Completely awesome. We had a total blast, and got to see and touch and play so many things. Some of the highlights for us:

• Seeing Derek at the Dragon Age II booth! Derek has worked for Bioware forEVER, and is the main reason Ed and I met in the first place – he organized Fragapalooza ’97, and I stayed at his house for the event. We hadn’t seen him in years, and it was completely awesome to catch up and see him doing so well.
• Ed got to sit in on the D&D panel he was drooling over – he was first in line to get in, and he had a great time
• Getting to play Fallout: New Vegas, Little Big Planet 2, Super Scribblenauts and Kirby’s Epic Yarn
• Spending all my money at the Scott Pilgrim booth
• Spending some quality time with the Suttles family
• The successful stalking of MC Frontalot
• The Plants vs. Zombies section
• My Bionic Moustache
• Coming up with the World’s Most Awesome Idea with Ali – details to come later

No con could ever be perfect, though:

• A recession-caused noticeable lack of swag (we still got a lot, but last year I ended up with enough to do 8 or 9 giveaways)
• No booths for Jet Set Radio Futurer or The World Ends With You Again
• We sat in on the Rage 3 demo panel, and while it looked awesome, it also looked an awful lot like Fallout 3
• The Haunted Cafe
• We didn’t get wristbands for the Frontalot/Coulton show – all 2500 wristbands were given out before 8:30 that morning
• I wasn’t the only Ramona there! I suck at cosplay.
• No chance to play/see Portal 2, Duke Nukem Forever, Guild Wars 2 or Dragon Age 2 – the lines wrapped around the booth and if I didn’t stand in line for the Olympics, I’m not going to stand in line for a t-shirt.
• This booth. Seriously? You’re marketing your company like this on PURPOSE? The guy at the booth saw me taking pictures of his banner, so he gave me a poster. Um, thanks. You’re a fucking idiot, and I’m glad your booth was on the hidden level that didn’t get as much traffic.

So much fun. Will definitely be doing PAX11. Will continue to try to convince friends to come along – seriously, people. PAX is a total blast. Why do you keep fighting me on this?

click to view my pax10 pictures